For us, pasta is more than just a food. It is a part of our histories. This simple substance, boiled in water and salt, has managed to sustain entire populations in the darkest times of poverty. It is a good friend, a member of the family. It is something we love.
When we are living well, it is over a plate of pasta that friendships are born and family ties are reinforced...It is the food we identify ourselves with as Italians and the food we miss most when we travel abroad.
She offers up this advice with regard to pasta shapes:
We Italians have more shapes for pasta than you can imagine...Short pasta shapes are used when you want to be able to stab the food with a fork, as you would if you had cut vegetables or meat in a pasta. Long thin strands, like spaghetti and linguine, are used with light, slippery sauces that will coat them. A rich, creamy sauce often wants a wide and substantial pasta shape, like pappardelle or festonate; otherwise the sauce will drown the pasta. Pasta with holes, like penne and rigatoni, hold ingredients inside them, if the ingredients are small, like peas or ground meat. And the groves on the outside of rigate, "ridged" pastas, help to hold a sauce.
Tomorrow: The names and shapes of pasta and how best to enjoy them.
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